The area is very sparsely populated, with many
mountain ranges dominating the region, and includes the highest mountain in the
British Isles,
Ben Nevis. Before the 19th century the Highlands was home to a much larger population, but from circa 1841 and for the next 160 years, the natural increase in population was exceeded by emigration (mostly to Canada, the USA and Australia) and migration to the industrial cities of Scotland and England.[2]:xxiii, 414 and passim The area is now one of the most sparsely populated in
Europe. At 9.1 per km2 (23.6 per square mile) in 2012,[3] the
population density in the Highlands and Islands is less than one seventh of Scotland's as a whole,[3] comparable with that of
Bolivia,
Chad and
Russia.[4][5]

History

Culture

Between the 15th century and the 20th century, the area differed from most of the
Lowlands in terms of language. In Scottish Gaelic, the region is known as the Gàidhealtachd,[6] because it was traditionally the Gaelic-speaking part of Scotland, although the language is now largely confined to
The Hebrides. The terms are sometimes used interchangeably but have different meanings in their respective languages.
Scottish English (in its
Highland form) is the predominant language of the area today, though Highland English has been influenced by Gaelic speech to a significant extent.[7] Historically, the "Highland line" distinguished the two Scottish cultures. While the Highland line broadly followed the geography of the Grampians in the south, it continued in the north, cutting off the north-eastern areas, that is
Caithness,
Orkney and
Shetland, from the more Gaelic Highlands and Hebrides.[8][9]

In the aftermath of the
Jacobite risings, the British government enacted a series of laws to try to speed up the destruction of the
clan system, including
bans on the bearing of arms and the wearing of
tartan, and limitations on the activities of the
Scottish Episcopal Church. Most of this legislation was repealed by the end of the 18th century as the Jacobite threat subsided. There was soon a rehabilitation of Highland culture. Tartan was adopted for Highland regiments in the British Army, which poor Highlanders joined in large numbers in the era of the Revolutionary and
Napoleonic Wars (1790–1815). Tartan had largely been abandoned by the ordinary people of the region, but in the 1820s, tartan and the
kilt were adopted by members of the social elite, not just in Scotland, but across Europe.[10][11] The international craze for tartan, and for idealising a romanticised Highlands, was set off by the
Ossian cycle,[12][13] and further popularised by the works of
Walter Scott. His "staging" of the
visit of King George IV to Scotland in 1822 and the king's wearing of tartan resulted in a massive upsurge in demand for kilts and tartans that could not be met by the Scottish woollen industry. Individual clan tartans were largely designated in this period and they became a major symbol of Scottish identity.[14] This "Highlandism", by which all of Scotland was identified with the culture of the Highlands, was cemented by Queen Victoria's interest in the country, her adoption of
Balmoral as a major royal retreat, and her interest in "tartenry".[11]

Economy

The Highlands before 1800 were very poor and traditional, and were not much affected by the uplift of the
Scottish Enlightenment or the
Industrial Revolution that was sweeping the Lowlands of Scotland. The period of the Napoleonic wars brought prosperity, optimism, and economic growth to the Highlands. The economy grew thanks to wages paid in industries such as kelping (in which
kelp was burned for the useful chemicals obtained from the ashes), fisheries, and weaving, as well as large-scale infrastructure spending such as the
Caledonian Canal project.[15][better source needed] On the East Coast, farmlands were improved, and high prices for cattle brought money to the area. Service in the Army was also attractive to young men from the Highlands, who sent pay home and retired there with their army pensions.[16] This prosperity ended after 1815, and long-term negative factors began to undermine the economic position of the poor tenant farmers, who typically rented a few
acres, and were known as
crofters. Landowners were increasingly market-oriented in the century after 1750, and this tended to dissolve the traditional social and economic structure of the North-West Highlands and the Hebrides, causing great disruption for the crofters. The
Highland Clearances and the end of the township system followed changes in land ownership and tenancy and the replacement of cattle by sheep.[17] The
Great Irish Famine of the 1840s was caused by a plant disease that reached the Highlands in 1846, causing great distress.

The unequal concentration of land ownership remained an emotional and controversial subject, of enormous importance to the Highland economy, and eventually became a cornerstone of liberal radicalism. The poor crofters were politically powerless, and many of them turned to religion. They embraced the popularly oriented, fervently evangelical Presbyterian revival after 1800.[18] Most joined the breakaway "Free Church" after 1843. This
evangelical movement was led by lay preachers who themselves came from the lower strata, and whose preaching was implicitly critical of the established order. The religious change energised the crofters and separated them from the landlords; it helped prepare them for their successful and violent challenge to the landlords in the 1880s through the
Highland Land League.[19]
Violence erupted, starting on the
Isle of Skye, when Highland landlords cleared their lands for sheep and deer parks. It was quietened when the government stepped in, passing the
Crofters' Holdings (Scotland) Act, 1886 to reduce rents, guarantee fixity of tenure, and break up large estates to provide crofts for the homeless.[20] This contrasted with the
Irish Land War under way at the same time, where the Irish were intensely politicised through roots in Irish nationalism, while political dimensions were limited. In 1885 three Independent Crofter candidates were elected to Parliament, which listened to their pleas. The results included explicit security for the Scottish smallholders; the legal right to bequeath tenancies to descendants; and the creation of a Crofting Commission. The Crofters as a political movement faded away by 1892, and the
Liberal Party gained their votes.[21]

Religion

The
Scottish Reformation achieved partial success in the Highlands. Roman Catholicism remained strong in some areas, owing to remote locations and the efforts of
Franciscan missionaries from Ireland, who regularly came to celebrate
Mass. Although the presence of Roman Catholicism has faded, there remain significant Catholic strongholds within the Highlands and Islands such as
Moidart and
Morar on the mainland and
South Uist and
Barra in the southern Outer Hebrides.
The remoteness of the region and the lack of a Gaelic-speaking clergy undermined the missionary efforts of the established church. The later 18th century saw somewhat greater success, owing to the efforts of the
SSPCK missionaries and to the disruption of traditional society after the
Battle of Culloden in 1746. In the 19th century, the evangelical Free Churches, which were more accepting of Gaelic language and culture, grew rapidly, appealing much more strongly than did the established church.[22]

For the most part, however, the Highlands are considered predominantly Protestant, loyal to the
Church of Scotland. In contrast to the Catholic southern islands, the northern
Outer Hebrides islands (Lewis, Harris and North Uist) have an exceptionally high proportion of their population belonging to the Protestant
Free Church of Scotland or the
Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The
Outer Hebrides have been described as the last bastion of
Calvinism in Britain[23] and the Sabbath remains widely observed. Inverness and the surrounding area has a majority Protestant population, with most locals belonging to either
The Kirk or the
Free Church of Scotland. The church maintains a noticeable presence within the area, with church attendance notably higher than in other Scottish cities. Religion continues to play an important role in Highland culture, with Sabbath observance still widely practised, particularly in the Hebrides.[24]

Historical geography

Inverness, the administrative centre and traditional capital of the Highlands

In traditional Scottish
geography, the Highlands refers to that part of Scotland north-west of the
Highland Boundary Fault, which crosses mainland Scotland in a near-straight line from
Helensburgh to
Stonehaven. However the flat coastal lands that occupy parts of the counties of
Nairnshire,
Morayshire,
Banffshire and
Aberdeenshire are often excluded as they do not share the distinctive geographical and cultural features of the rest of the Highlands. The north-east of
Caithness, as well as
Orkney and
Shetland, are also often excluded from the Highlands, although the
Hebrides are usually included. The Highland area, as so defined, differed from the
Lowlands in language and tradition, having preserved
Gaelic speech and customs centuries after the
anglicisation of the latter; this led to a growing perception of a divide, with the cultural distinction between Highlander and Lowlander first noted towards the end of the 14th century. In
Aberdeenshire, the boundary between the Highlands and the Lowlands is not well defined. There is a stone beside the
A93 road near the village of
Dinnet on
Royal Deeside which states 'You are now in the Highlands', although there are areas of Highland character to the east of this point.

Inverness is traditionally regarded as the capital of the Highlands,[26] although less so in the Highland parts of
Aberdeenshire,
Angus,
Perthshire and
Stirlingshire which look more to
Aberdeen,
Perth,
Dundee and
Stirling as their commercial centres. Under some of the wider definitions in use,
Aberdeen could be considered the largest city in the Highlands, although it does not share the recent Gaelic cultural history typical of the Highlands proper.

Courier delivery

Although most of the Highlands is geographically on the British mainland, it is somewhat less accessible than the rest of Britain; thus most UK couriers categorise it separately, alongside
Northern Ireland, the
Isle of Man, and other offshore islands. They thus charge additional fees for delivery to the Highlands, or exclude the area entirely. Whilst the physical remoteness from the largest population centres inevitably leads to higher transit cost, there is confusion and consternation over the scale of the fees charged and the effectiveness of their communication,[29] and the use of the word Mainland in their justification. Since the charges are often based on postcode areas, many far less remote areas, including some which are traditionally considered part of the lowlands, are also subject to these charges.[29]Royal Mail is the only delivery network bound by a Universal Service Obligation to charge a uniform tariff across the UK. This, however, applies only to mail items and not larger packages which are dealt with by its
Parcelforce division.

Geology

Liathach seen from
Beinn Eighe. With the Munro "Top" of Stuc a' Choire Dhuibh Bhig 915 m (3,001 ft) in the foreground and the two Munro summits in the background.

The entire region was covered by ice sheets during the
Pleistocene ice ages, save perhaps for a few
nunataks. The complex
geomorphology includes incised valleys and
lochs carved by the action of mountain streams and ice, and a
topography of irregularly distributed mountains whose summits have similar heights above sea-level, but whose bases depend upon the amount of
denudation to which the plateau has been subjected in various places.

^George Robb (1990). "Popular Religion and the Christianisation of the Highlands in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries". Journal of Religious History. 16 (1): 18–34.
doi:
10.1111/j.1467-9809.1990.tb00647.x.